Retailer John Lewis has for most of its plus 150-year history been associated with stellar customer service, bright and welcoming stores and quality-made products.
What it has achieved in the bustling, competitive and ever-changing high-street it is now trying to replicate in the world of optometry through a link-up with Luxottica UK. That ambition can be seen in its in-store John Lewis Opticians offering in Kingston-upon-Thames, south London which opened last November.
The store, the first in a series of optical concessions planned for roll-out in the next couple of years, not only sells high-end brands such as Giorgio Armani and Prada but has created a store design it believes sets a standard for the industry.
According to designers Innovare, which has previous experience in the industry designing stores for David Clulow, the design includes ‘coloured acrylics’, a more space-efficient main sales area and consultation zones, and low-level mirrors to define its kids’ zone.
The 100sq m space also allows space for two examination rooms, a pre-screening, contact lens teaching area and a back of house laboratory. Innovare’s creative director Lloyd Blakey explains more: ‘For John Lewis, with its reputation of quality service we really wanted to design something with a clear focus on the customer. They can be transient, they can get product online so how can we draw them in to our stores,’ he states. ‘We wanted a fresh, soft and comfortable look with lots of natural materials. We didn’t want anything too clinical, that laboratory and white coat philosophy you see in other stores.’
Technology and the installation of state-of the art examination equipment such as Optical Coherence Tomography was also vital. ‘Luxottica has Gucci and Prada under licence so customers have a lot more choice with their eyewear. But also being able to offer them the best eye test and up-to-date equipment gives them reassurance,’ says Blakey.
Innovare has also focused on customer flow in an opticians store. ‘We have analysed this at the David Clulow store in Guildford,’ Blakey explains. ‘We have tried to make that journey from consultation, to test and then to choosing your glasses a lot easier. Indeed, at Guildford we found that staff were hanging behind the cash desk which was putting customers off approaching them. We have now built the cash-desk into the wall which makes for more engagement between customers and staff.’
Fashion and optometry fusion
Back in 2014 Asad Hamir opened Kite at Westfield in Stratford, East London with the aim of tapping into the growing fusion between optometry and fashion.
‘I come from a family of optometrists,’ Hamir says. ‘I worked in the sector when I was a teenager but then left to study and set up a successful business in the telecoms sector. When I came back to optometry I saw nothing had changed – the same tortoiseshell eyewear and Vision Express-style stores.’
[CaptionComponent="2269"]By creating Kite he offered something different. ‘Kite gives that first 30 seconds welcome that customers expect,’ he says. ‘It is about coming into the store, feeling relaxed and inspired without feeling the pressure of having to buy something. You come in and see big screens, an explosion of colour with handpainted murals and music to fit the time of day.’
The central area has a communal table allowing customers to try out frames with stylish lighting and use of wood. Bright colours predominate throughout.
It also embraces digital technology with customers able to take pictures of themselves in store and share on social media using touch screen mirrors known as kiosks.
‘It is exciting but the eye test area at the back of the store is much quieter,’ he states. ‘Our customers have an average age of about 30 years old. They see eyewear regularly featured in GQ magazine and they want something a little bit different, courageous and experimental. The customer is changing and you have to move with the times and connect with them. It’s not just a new shop-fit, you have to look at the whole customer experience.’
But can these ambitious designs and lofty aims be replicated in a high street setting outside London? John High, now part of the Eye Emporium group, had its store in Faversham, Kent, refurbished last year. In has more attractive shop fronts, new reception areas, modern test rooms and more designer brands.
‘The store needed updating and being brought back to life,’ explains store manager Philip Jackson. ‘The layout is brilliant now – our reception desk used to be like a cave being positioned under the stairs! Now the office is open plan and that has given us enough space to triple the number of frames we display.’
Jason Rice I-Care in Nuneaton was spruced up at the end of 2014. Owner Fay Rice explains it worked with agency Retail Experience Design to carry out a ‘desperately needed’ change.
‘It was completely dated as we hadn’t touched it for 17 years,’ she says. ‘Edges and carpets were wearing, we had very limited window displays and our reception desk took up about 25 per cent of the store space. It was not very inviting for customers. We did not want to alienate our older and loyal clients but we wanted to attract new ones.’
The result was a more open, light and bright store with lilac colours and pale wood on the fittings rather than the heavy oak used previously. A mock brick wall at the back of the store helped ‘soften’ the look, adds Rice, with better lighting and a smaller reception desk installed.
John Lewis talks of attracting a more upwardly mobile customer while Kite talks of feeling ‘bullish as customers appreciate our quality and thought’.
But it is in Nuneaton and Faversham where the real business impact of making these design changes can best be analysed.
Jackson at John High says store footfall has dramatically increased. ‘Our store is much more inviting and we’ve had loads more, tonnes more customers. Our usual patients in their 60s or 70s are still coming in but we are also seeing a lot more younger people now,’ he says. ‘We’ve doubled the number of new patients and we’ve lifted staff morale. It is a much happier place to work. It was dreary before.’
He says only that the refurbishment came at a ‘huge cost’ but that it is ‘paying dividends’. He adds: ‘My message to opticians is make these changes and get ahead of your competition.’
Rice is more open about the investment it put into its revamp – £80,000 in total. ‘The initial impact was an overall 20% sales lift. We have still seen a 10% lift in new frame sales but overall revenues have settled back now. But we are happy with maintaining that level because if you look at our high street it is full of empty shops. We are still here,’ she says.
Rice adds that the store is seeing more new clients particularly on a Saturday. ‘It’s funny because we have been in the same place for 17 years and we are getting people coming in and asking us if we are new!’ she says.
Further evidence of positive impact from a redesign comes from Paris where design firm Brandimage has worked with French opticians Optic 2000.
[CaptionComponent="2270"]Annette Klek, client director at Brandimage, picks out one sales highlight since it carried out the major store redesign in 2014 – a 20% lift between December 2014 and January 2015 compared to the previous year.
Its revamped design included better use of space to allow customers to ‘circulate and stroll around more easily and more private areas to sit down’.
A custom unit has been designed to allow trending products to be placed centre stage in the store with shop windows also boasting top selling frames to encourage customers to enter the store. Technological and digital tools such as customers being able to ‘virtually’ try on new glasses have also been added.
‘We have had very positive feedback from the customers but the staff also feel more comfortable with the clients. They are more at ease,’ she states. ‘We have innovated and we have enhanced the personality of the brand.’
That is a key word for Innovare’s Blakey who stresses that opticians of all shapes and sizes can benefit from a store redesign. ‘Get some reclaimed tables, go for a non-corporate look. People will buy into it,’ he says. ‘What is important is that the personality of the optician comes through. Keep the message simple and tell your story.’